njurious Wit--The Everlasting
Club--The Lovers' Club--Castles in the Air--The
Guardian--Contributions by Pope--"The Agreeable
Companion"--The Wonderful Magazine--Joe Miller--Pivot
Humour 77

CHAPTER VI.

Sterne--His Versatility--Dramatic Form--Indelicacy--Sentiment
and Geniality--Letters to his Wife--Extracts
from his Sermons--Dr. Johnson 99

CHAPTER VII.

Dodsley--"A Muse in Livery"--"The Devil's a Dunce"--"The
Toy Shop"--Fielding--Smollett 113

CHAPTER VIII.

Cowper--Lady Austen's Influence--"John Gilpin"--"The
Task"--Goldsmith--"The Citizen of the World"--Humorous
Poems--Quacks--Baron Muenchausen 127

CHAPTER IX.

The Anti-Jacobin--Its Objects and Violence--"The
Friends of Freedom"--Imitation of Latin Lyrics--The
"Knife Grinder"--The "Progress of Man" 141

CHAPTER X.

Wolcott--Writes against the Academicians--Tales of a
Hoy--"New Old Ballads"--"The Sorrows of Sunday"--Ode
to a Pretty Barmaid--Sheridan--Comic Situations--"The
Duenna"--Wits 150

CHAPTER XI.

Southey--Drolls of Bartholomew Fair--The "Doves"--Typographical
Devices--Puns--Poems of Abel Shufflebottom 164

CHAPTER XII.

Lamb--His Farewell to Tobacco--Pink Hose--On the
Melancholy of Tailors--Roast Pig 175

CHAPTER XIII.

Byron--Vision of Judgment--Lines to Hodgson--Beppo--Humorous
Rhyming--Profanity of the Age 184

CHAPTER XIV.

Theodore Hook--Improvisatore Talent--Poetry--Sydney
Smith--The "Dun Cow"--Thomas Hood--Gin--Tylney
Hall--John Trot--Barham's Legends 196

CHAPTER XVI.

Douglas Jerrold--Liberal Politics--Advantages of Ugliness--Button
Conspiracy--Advocacy of Dirt--The "Genteel
Pigeons" 207

CHAPTER XVII.

Thackeray--His Acerbity--The Baronet--The Parson--Medical
Ladies--Glorvina--"A Serious Paradise" 216

CHAPTER XVIII.

Dickens--Sympathy with the Poor--Vulgarity--Geniality--Mrs.
Gamp--Mixture of Pathos and Humour--Lever
and Dickens compared